1984 Renault 11 (G)TL 1.4

bncrew yeah I remember your username all right. I think my username was briera (first initial last name, opposite to my username here). I think you may just live south of me. I remember years ago I was driving the 11 or maybe the white 19 past the beehive on the N11 and someone in a 19 flashed me. I think it was a supervan. Honestly as long as your bolts aren't too rusty I'd be inclined to try swap the subframes. I remember considering it but had such a hassle with a rusted bolt on the 19s just changing the clutch I abandoned that idea before I even measured anything. You'd proabably end up with a slightly wider track but that's a good thing. I know the rear axle can be swapped to widen that end too. I have a very vague memory of reading a forum post somewhere translated from French through google translate saying the Clio subframe works (yeah maybe don't trust that as I know they have a side hanging engine mount!). And I know the Clio frame goes into an R5. I think the 9, 11, 5, 19, clio all use a variation of the same subframe. I've had pretty good luck so far with bolt holes lining up. Renault did it to keep development costs down for about 20 odd years.

I forgot to mention how frustrating one part of swapping door cars was... The door lock pins from my car were too short. You couldn't push them down far enough to lock. And no, I didn't forget to take them from the parts car. Someone painted them red, stripped the plastic threads and glued them back on. I had to break all four to remove the door cars from the parts car.
So I ended up carefully bending the rods in the doors and realligning them until they came up far enough.


I had a whole load of spares that I got with my eBay haul when I replaced my headlights. Thankfully it came with tail lights that have been sitting in the shed for the past year. This one was leaking badly even after silicone so it has been swapped out. Notice the A letter reg stamped on the new one. Luckily you have to be close to see it.

Unbelievably, this 33 year old french car now has no leaks! Thinking about it, I don't think I've ever seen an Irish car with the reg on the lights and/or windows but I've seen it on plenty of old UK cars. Was car theft really that bad?


After having a terrible time getting it running (at all) when I changed the tank, I cleaned out the return, vent and degassing lines. I clamped the fuel send hose in all necessary places as there were none from factory! I think it was sucking air at points. I also gave up once and for all on the stupid carb and dug the mystery eBay one out of the shed and rebuilt it with a kit from Croatia I think. It couldn't possibly be worse than the other one. It looked a lot cleaner on the inside and this time I poked through everything with guitar strings to be sure it was all good.

It's back on now, the choke cable is lubed up (finally doesn't stick) and I've put a new accelerator cable on. Unfortunately the end has to be soldered on (I think). If it isn't raining I'll get the blow torch and old lead solder out tomorrow. I haven't started the engine yet though. I'll wait to finish the cable.

This is my sort of thread. Top stuff.

Brilliant work! I only joined up for this thread 👍🏻 I have a Renault 9 in the same colour with same interior etc. Want to take it on as a project 😉

Ah the white supervan at the beehive would be Clive, I'm in rosslare, my GTL is pretty much a carbon copy of yours, same interior etc and considering going the same route as yours, if you get the chance you gotta research the intermittent wiper mod more, I NEED to have that in mine, it's the greatest thing I've ever seen, ideally I'll recreate that in mine using a a rheostat adjuster from a 19 which I think might look well

Haven't had much chance to work on the car between the bad spring weather and only being home on the weekends.
I noticed that the coolant level was dropping every time I opened the bonnet and the car wasn't even running! Sure enough, I found the cause. The coolant pipe on the back of the intake manifold. I poked it and it snapped clean off... The first thing that went through my head was "now the parts car (chamade) was officially a total waste of time. All I have left working is the flywheel sensor".
I handed it over to a local mechanic as I didn't have time to figure it out. He said it wasn't the first time he'd seen a Renault manifold end up this way from the old energy engines.


I had some serious fun removing the carb I had just put on and a few stubborn nuts on the manifold itself.


The original pipe wasn't welded on to the manifold. It sort of just sat in there and was sealed in some way. Just got a copper pipe sealed in with chemical metal I was told.


I finally decided to tackle the throttle cable end. For some reason I had it in my head that you are supposed to solder the end on with a blow torch... Well the metal the end was made of actually melted BEFORE the lead solder! I quickly saved it though and sanded it back into shape. It's lost about 1cm in length but it does the job and so far has not snapped. It wasn't a particularly fun job getting nasty plumbing soldering flux all over my hands. Took forever to wash off too.


God only knows where the original clip for the adjustment went. It never came along to the 11 anyway. A cut up and bent paper clip seems to work fine and is hardly noticable.

So I refilled the coolant (probably the fifth time in 1000 miles!) and gave the carb a quick tune up (from memory). I poured petrol in through the float vent, pulled the choke and it fired right up! A few more adjustments and it was fine. Took it for a spin and it was driving brilliantly. Much better than ever although I was babying it. The anxiety though... staring at the gauges constantly thinking it would die or blow up! The temp gauge was way off though and had me worried. Went past 3/4 before the fan kicked in although there was no bubbling or anything so I just adjusted the needle position on the dash. Presumably from me ripping it apart piece by piece. Oh yeah... Petrol gauge works when it wants and has a mind of its own.

Went and filled up the tank with 42 litres and then the fun began... Turned the key and click. That's all. Battery is fine as the lights didn't dim or anything. Now I'm really hoping to not have to replace the solenoid. Luckily my mom was down the road and she came along and with the help of someone she recognised on the forecourt, got a push start. Only had one person laugh at me in an Audi Q7. Whatever, at least my car costs nothing to tax/insure even if it never runs! Left it until the morning in case it was a heat soak issue. Nope, same problem.

I decided to try the cheapest option first. I didn't feel like removing the started and dissasembling/lubing it up needlessly. I bought some new thick battery cables. Halfords finest. It was Sunday, nowhere else was open.
I sanded down all the connections, replaced two cables from the alternator to the starter and the starter to battery positive. This time I blow torch soldered the cable ends into the connectors I replaced a few years ago.


I think the blow torch is my new best friend! The starter spun faster than ever. Notice my new red/black cables. I changed all the earthing cables when I swapped the engine.

More fun on Sunday/Monday. Slowly but surely, the engine would lean out and the idle would drop to a lumpy 500rpm when the engine got hot and thankfully only stalled once. No adjustments would cure it. Thought it was an air leak but the choke solved it so I checked the idle circuit. Pulled out the idle mix screw and idle jet. Clogged and gunky! I just rebuilt this! A quick clean and no problems have come back. I'm going to assume it's because I didn't change the fuel system all at the same time and I've got to just let petrol run through for a while and keep tools on hand.

I gave it a proper wash which included having to get a plastic scrubbing brush to get black spots/sap off. Then a hand polish and wax. Probably the first time since 2012. It needs a machine polish at some stage. I'll take some photos when I'm home on the weekend. I didn't feel up to driving across the country so soon in it.

NCT (MOT/Inspection) booked for the 8th of April! Fingers crossed! It'll probably die on the way to the test centre though...

my sister had a black ren 19 1.4 energy. in actual fact the first car i ever drove on the queens highway.

Indeed. Welcome to the rip off island nation where they keep telling us our taxes are lower than most of Europe as if it's some sort of excuse or consolation for dumping on the common tax payer... Yeah sure I believe you Mr. Kenny... I was insured for €550 at the age of 23 here in Ireland on the R11 before it was a classic. I went to NY for just over 3 years, came back and they chose to ignore the fact that I was insured over there and the only company that would quote me on a 1999 corolla (AXA) wanted €2200 for insurance alone. Everybody else said me and the car were too high risk for them to even consider! I'm nearly 28 with no convictions and 9 years on my licence! Yes a silver bug-eyed unloved cockroach shaped liftback Corolla was high risk. That and the €514 in tax for a piddly 1.6l engine. Don't even get me started! Oh and lets not forget the NCT! Tell me it's not biased after you bring a car over 15 years old in and the test takes 45 minutes as they tap every inch of the car looking for nonexistant filler when a five year old car goes through in under 15 minutes with barely a second look and most things seemingly skipped over.
People of the UK and USA, you are very, very lucky!

So a no picture short update. Just about ready to torch this car once and for all! It was driving absolutely perfectly for two weekends. I decided to swap the fuel guage/pick up as the original was still dead. Drove a mile and a half down the road and it ran out of petrol. Unlike the previous times this happened, it wasn't a blockage. It just wouldn't fill the float bowl in the carb. Walked home and back with the old pickup and a hand primer. No joy. Only way it would start was pouring petrol into the bowl and once it was empty that was it. Had to get towed home. Borrowed a large foot pump and drew up a litre of petrol through the lines in case it was air pockets or something. I also pulled apart the carb and swapped the float needle and seat and reset the float level as it was off with the different neddle. The pump is pumping petrol (Well sort of splurting and then pumping at high revs. Not sure if that's normal but it's new!) and the return line has petrol going back out. There's 3/4 a tank of petrol too. The float bowl in the carb just will not fill. There are no blockages. Carb cleaner freely flows through everything. I'm just going to get it towed to an old timer mechanic and leave it there until the damn thing works again. Completely stumped by this new problem. Not sure if it would have happened or not if I didn't swap the sender unit.